FX and NX – Foreign Policy

Ignatius makes some interesting comments. Foreign policy and national strength are often thought of in zero-sum terms – there’s only so much power to go around, so if one country/bloc gains some, then others must lose some. I’d argue that Neocons tend to think this way (though they’re not the only ones), viewing the rise of other countries as diminishing U.S. power and influence. But is that true? Note the ‘market share’ comments near the end of the article – how much is enough for a particular situation, and can’t two countries both do well without it diminishing the other?

We had a bipolar world order during the Cold War; then the Iron Curtain fell and over the next few years many argued that we had moved to a unipolar world. Is that still the case, or are we into a multipolar world, with multiple poles of power? If we’ve entered a multipolar era, then will we return to a unipolar world order simply because some politicians in our country want that to be the case again? What effect would that approach have in a world that has moved on to a new pattern?